Saturday, December 10, 2011

I’m looking at covering where we’ve been since my last pictorial entry prior to my detachment. There have been so many places we’ve been so I’ve limited it to Beckonscot in Beckonsfield in March 2011 in one blog entry, and everywhere else in a second. I’m just glad to be back home now and start blogging again about Sharon and the kids…so without further ado….

We went there on a fantastic sunny spring day. Perfect…couldn’t have asked for a better day before I left so we took advantage of it and had a ball.

Beckonscot is a model village which is quite famous around the south east of England. It has certainly expanded over the last few years and is a roomy and fun day out for the family, regardless of age.

Saturday, August 13, 2011

I know I've been a bit quiet recently, but I'm out of the country at the moment. I'll be back in a couple of weeks for a fortnights leave then back properly in November. It's been a long time away looking back on it. I got here in April, but the 6 month training was a bit of a pain. I hardly saw them. And I have only had a few weeks with little Lucy so a big bonding session is called for when I get back. Sharon's back at home with the kids and they're are all fine but we've lost Gypsy, our cat. She went downhill quite fast so hopefully she didn't suffer.

Sharon's due to go away in February 2012 for 4 months so we'll have to make the most of our 3 months together. Expect lots of stories of where we take the kids..

Saturday, March 26, 2011

A typical day over in Fermanagh…sunny, lots to do and nice people..(only joking – it’s not normally that sunny)…there is so much to do and I genuinely believe it is the most wonderful county in the United Kingdom…

We started out taking the kids to see the new lambs at a family friends farm…

Then we went to Castle Archdale, a country park by Loch Erne. Its staggeringly beautiful with lots to do. First off, we fed the ducks at the moor side

Then to the visitors centre..that has so much history behind it. During WW2, it housed crews of seaplanes that patrolled the North Atlantic to protect the convoys from America. Prior to that it was a stately home of the Archdale family…the grounds and buildings are magnificent. Although the main house fell into disrepair and was demolished in 1973, the rest of the complex remains and has been restored..

We had a lovely picnic there…and all that good country air completely trashed the kids that night

We took a weeks leave to go back to Ireland and see our family and our new house. Again Sharon’s sister Denise looked after us like royalty, and nieces Laura and Elaine pampered us and really made us feel at home. Thanks to the Armstrong's for that xxx.

We were lucky enough to be over for Paddys Day this year…especially so because Enniskillen had reintroduced the Paddys Day parade through the town.
The kids loved it…we went with Laura together with her son Matthew, Denise and their brother Stephens kids Alex and Dillon, and Elaine….so all in all, a nice little group of going down to see Paddy arriving at Enniskillen on the boat and walking through the town.

Now the parade was a bit random…there were trucks going down there that got me wondering….like one with concrete pipes on, a fleet of unmarked white vans, a completely unusual gathering of a trike, followed by a knight galloping on an imaginary horse then an old VW Beetle…I got to thinking what Paddy would actually make of it…..